York City's official club historian DAVID BATTERS described this week's announcement spelling the end of Bootham Crescent as an arena of dreams as one of the saddest days of his sporting life. Here he tells the Evening Press what it has meant to be a York City fan for more than five decades....

I WAS nine-years-old when I saw my first York City game at Bootham Crescent.

Now I am 63 and facing the stark reality that a ground which has furnished me with so many memories - a lot of them happy - is on the verge of being no more.

It has left me feeling numbed and shocked and I am sure I am not alone in feeling a tremendous sense of sadness.

York City has been a major part of my life - some would even say too much a part. But ever since being taken to that first game - a Division Three North match at home to Mansfield Town on Saturday, October 23, 1948 - York City has been my club.

In a crowd of almost 11,000 I was edged to the front of the Popular Stand and was able to peer over the top of the wooden fence, which back then ringed the pitch.

Swept up by the excitement and the atmosphere, helped by City winning 2-1, players such as Bert Brenen, Matt Patrick, Alf Patrick, Sid Storey and Jimmy Rudd became heroes. I was a City fan.

The passion for the club has not dimmed since. The crowds from the boom years after the Second World War through to the 1960s when rattles, bells, rosettes and scarves were the order of the day, may have decreased.

But through it all, I, like so many others, remain a York City supporter. The club is my local club, my home-town club, the club where I have had so many good times.

There have been ups and downs. The highlights include the great FA Cup days of the 1950s, the promotion triumphs taking us into the old Second Division, the championship points' record of 1983-84 and, of course, the winning day at Wembley and the cup conquests of Arsenal, Manchester United and Everton.

In turn there have been the seasons of struggle, the despair of relegation and spectre of re-election, plus defeats that hurt.

Good days and bad days are enjoyed and endured by every team, but unlike the bigger clubs York City has always prided itself on being a small family club, a close-knit community. That's why this week's announcement has been like losing a very close friend.

If the club is to close down then the most poignant loss will be those friendships I have made over the years.

You go down to Bootham Crescent on a Saturday, or in midweek, and you chat to the same people before the match. There are a few moans and groans of course, but you have that same sense of identity.

You share a common bond of being in the same boat. It is part of the community and it is a vital part. Now it looks as if that sense of togetherness, that feeling of camaraderie, will be lost.

I look back at more than half a century of watching and supporting my local team at Bootham Crescent with great affection and nostalgia.

Now it is with great sadness and a sense of disbelief that the club and the ground may not exist in a few months' time.

I cannot imagine that Bootham Crescent will not be there and like many York fans, I feel so let down.

Updated: 12:33 Saturday, January 12, 2002